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 Parents at the Town Hall on Monday |
‘Why we want school in south of the borough’
Parents still campaigning for children’s future
DOZENS of deputations file through the Town Hall every year but few pack as an articulate punch as the tag team of Emma Jones and Polly Shields.
In their quest to get a new secondary school built south of the Euston Road, they have helped mobilise a legion of campaigning parents on a huge scale.
The lack of school places in the area has been a problem for three decades – but only in the last 12 months has the campaign developed into a sturdy lobby which now threatens to be a constant headache for councillors in power.
Ms Jones said: “We won’t go away. Twelve months ago, you wouldn’t get people turning up to be in a picture for the campaign. Things have changed. People believe in this. They believe things can change. In the past, people would say: ‘This is a problem, but nothing is going to change’. People realise that this is an issue for the whole community. It’s not just one family finding it difficult.”
Even being told last month that the council plans to use government money to build a new school in Swiss Cottage – not Bloomsbury or Holborn – has failed to dampen the defiance.
Instead, these campaigners are trying to tip the balance at the Town Hall and convince education chiefs to look south. And all of this is being done in their spare time and for the benefit of future generations of children, rather than their own. If the Town Hall backed down today and agreed to build a school, it might be too late for families involved in the campaign.
Nevertheless, on Monday night, Ms Jones and Ms Shields were back at the Town Hall for their second appearance in front of the full council this year. In went a 2,000-name petition – with Labour MP Frank Dobson’s name on the front sheet.
Ms Jones said: “It is tenacity that will win the day in the end. Nobody disagrees with us on the principle – apart from a few politicians maybe. We have made the case for a new school. You can’t really argue against it.”
The deputation was timed perfectly and smartly delivered by Ms Jones, an actress. It was backed up with graphs and graphics which showed how isolated the southern wards of Camden are in terms of secondary school places.
Ms Jones said: “The arguments we come up against are cost and availability. These are exactly the arguments that were used when there wasn’t a primary school in the area – in the end we got Christopher Hatton and it has been a real success story.”
The two women are modest about their achievements so far. They have a 2,000-strong petition but no agreement for a new school – therefore there is no time to rest.
Ms Jones said: “I don’t want this to be just the Emma Jones show. It isn’t. There are so many people involved. Take Andrew Gillman. He is another parent who has helped. He started the website which has created a lot of interest. He had never built a website before and said he would give it a go and it has really helped.”
She added: “It started for me when I started to look around for a school for my children and realised that there was nowhere for them to go. I spoke to other people in the area and they had the same problem. It was only then that I discovered this is a problem that has gone back 30 years. It needs to be addressed. I began a petition and it has developed from there.”
The campaign has been represented at nearly every relevant meeting, be it sitting in from the public benches at the Schools Organisation Committee – a committee, most people in Camden do not know exists – or a grandstand deputation as on Monday.
In August, a community meeting was organised in Bloomsbury. Only a handful of people turned up to the Dragon Hall for the discussion. The low turnout didn’t seem to matter to Ms Shields, who spent two hours outlining the case for a new school.
Ms Jones said: “You have to keep going – and we do because we believe in what we are saying. There is a need for a new school here.” |
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